Exploring chromatin dynamics guided by steroid hormones

Miguel Beato is a molecular biologist and senior scientist at the “Gene Regulation, Stem Cells and Cancer” programme of the CRG. He studied Medicine in Barcelona and did his MD and PhD in Germany. After 3 years as postdoc in Columbia University, New York, he returned to Marburg in Germany, where he founded the Institute for Molecular Biology and Tumour Research (IMT) that he directed 1990-95. In 1998 he participated in the establishment of the Departament of Experimental and Health Sciences (CEXS) of the Universitat Pompeu Fabra, and in 2000 he created the Center for Genomic Regulation (CRG), of which he was Director and coordinator of the Gene Regulation Programme until June 2011. Since then he is a Senior Group Leader and coordinates the ERC Synergy Grant on 4D human genome structure.

Research and talk summary

His research is centered on the molecular mechanisms underlying the control of eukaryotic gene expression by steroid hormones. In the last years he has focused on the role of chromatin dynamics and how it is affected by crosstalk of the hormone receptors with kinase signaling cascades. His talk will summarize recent results on the dynamics of chromatin changes taking place in the genome of breast cancer cells exposed to progestins and on how the energetic demands of these processes are covered by the nuclear generation of ATP. He will also address other aspects of gene regulation revealed studying hormone action. The aim is to integrate the dynamic hormone signalling network and the gene regulatory network with the changes in chromatin topology and epigenetic marks to generate a multidimensional network. Perturbations of this network could be used to stratify breast cancers and to target particular hubs.